Mass Effect: Exodus Rising
by Commander Zaiya Shepard
Summary: In the aftermath of the war with the Reapers, peace is finally a conceivable future. Cerberus is wiped out, having crumbled after the Illusive Man's death. The Reapers are gone, destroyed by the Crucible. But without the threat of them to unite the galaxy, how long can peace last? How long before the galaxy needs a hero to save it once more?
1. Chapter 1

-The Citadel-

Don't get romantically involved. That had always been Shepard's rule, from the very beginning. Don't get romantically involved with the crew. It caused unnecessary drama. And she broke her own rule on her very first journey as a commander. She couldn't help it, really. When she met Liara...it was like nothing else she'd ever felt before. Before she really had a chance to do anything about it, she fell for the young Asari doctor...and Liara fell in love with her, too. The things you thought, as you were about to die...in life itself it was probably no longer than a second.

The sound of the gunshots, the look of determination on her face as she stepped towards the generator. This would destroy the reapers. It would save Earth, and the fleets fighting there. More importantly...it would save Liara. Everything she'd worked for, everything she'd done up to this point...it had all been for her. If it hadn't been for Liara, she would've lost it all a long time ago. She wouldn't have made it here, to the Catalyst.

The generator started to spark and explode, flames erupting up from it as Shepard closed her eyes and let the flames consume her, her last thoughts going to her girlfriend. _I love you Liara..._

-The Normandy-

"The Crucible is armed. All fleets retreat." The fleets left the system one by one, all except the Normandy. On board Joker was switching between channels, searching for any sign. Any hint. Anything, to signal Shepard...and then Ashley gently placed a hand on his shoulder, shaking her head. "We gotta go."

Joker looked at the control panel, sighing before he made a fist, slamming it into the control panel. "Damn it." He made the jump out of the system, at the very last minute. The sound of the Crucible firing echoed behind them, and he struggled to keep control as they continued.

The Normandy traveled through the deepest parts of the Milky Way, testing it's very limits as Joker frantically tapped away on the controls, shutting off safety defaults and several alerts as the ship started to hiss and spark, the energy surge from The Crucible easily keeping pace with them. The engines short circuited and shutdown as the beam caught up with them, Edi shutting offline and the ship crash-landed on some planet in the middle of nowhere.

Joker stumbled out of the smoking Normandy, examining it before he shook his head. The ship was damaged, but he could fix it. Quite easily, actually. He turned towards the sunset then, stepping towards it to examine the sky, without a sign of Reapers in the area as he forced a bitter smile. "She did it...the Reapers...they're gone. She did it." He turned to his left then, Liara standing beside him as she looked at the sky herself, tears running down her face as she looked up at the sky.

There was only one thought running through the Asari's head, making her feel numb in ways she couldn't explain. _'My Shepard is gone. My Shepard...dead. She sacrificed her life to stop the Reapers...' _The Asari tore her eyes away from the view, her eyes full of pain as she started to walk away from the rest of the crew, trying to keep herself under control.

"Liara..." She heard Ashley's voice, and the sound of her starting towards her before Joker interrupted her.

"No. Let her go Ashley. She needs time to deal with..." Joker's voice faded away as she got further and further away from the others, until she finally couldn't take it anymore. She just slumped down, her vision blurring with tears as she sat at the base of a tree in the jungle, her thoughts overtaking her.

"My Shepard..." Liara looked up at the sky, tears running down her cheeks as she watched the stars start to come out, scanning the horizon for...something. Anything. She didn't know how long she'd been sitting there when someone took a seat beside her, the Spectre sighing before she spoke softly.

"Liara...she did it. She stopped them. Saved us. All of us. The entire galaxy...and she did it knowing she'd have to die...but she did it because she loved you. Because she wanted you to be happy. To survive. She would want you to be happy." Liara looked away from her, saying nothing as she felt the tears in her eyes once more, finally finding the strength to speak.

"I never should've left her...I should've stayed at her side. Should've gone with her..." Liara looked down now, feeling something she couldn't explain. "This is the second time I've lost her...and this time...she won't be back."

"Hey now. You don't know that. Shepard came back from the dead once. She might do it again. We put up a hell of a fight against the Reapers. We united the entire galaxy to stand against them. I doubt there's ever been an army the size of what we brought together that day. If there was a chance she survived...she did. She'd do anything to come back to you Liara. Anything." The Lieutenant Commander stood up then, pausing to look at Liara. "I've gotta get back to the others now. You should come too. They're worried about you Liara."

Liara said nothing as she watched Ashley leave, considering her words before she looked back up at the stars, now feeling hope. It might have been a very small chance...but it was a chance. _I will find you Shepard...I promise...and I'll never leave you again. _The Asari smiled, standing up before she turned towards the Normandy and started back towards the others. They had a ship to repair, and the sooner the better.

They couldn't exactly find Shepard while they were stranded on the planet.

-Cronos Station-

The station was a ruined mess, left behind after Shepard's battle with Kai Leng. The station had been steadily losing power, and was now running on backup generators. Entire sections of the base were dark and uninhabitable, no power supporting them. The base had been designed to focus solely on keeping the Illusive Man's control room running, at all costs. Even that was running out of power now, the AI running the base having been destroyed by the Crucible's energy.

And yet oddly enough...it wasn't the only thing in the relay. There was a fleet of ships as well, nothing near the size of the fleets that had been at the battle for Earth, but a fleet nonetheless. They had made the jump before the relays had been destroyed, and they had even intended to dock on the base. Now...that wasn't an option. They were barely keeping they're own ships up and running, having every able-bodied man and woman working to keep the ship online.

They had to manually go in and rewrite the very code itself, all their AI's mysteriously shutting off after the Crucible fired.

A man stood at the top of one of the larger ships, looking out through a window down at some of the other people running around, shaking his head as he turned to his desk, an odd symbol on emblazoned on his chest. "I can't believe it. Months of planning, and the perfect opportunity wasted, and all because of some god damned weapon used against the Reapers." The man shook his head in annoyance, sighing as he shuffled through some papers on his desk.

At first, Shepard attacking the Cerberus base had worked out in their favor. They'd been trying to figure out how to raid the base for what seemed like ages, and then Shepard launched her own attack. Their inside agents had told them that the base was in ruins after the attack, and Cerberus was starting to evacuate. Admiral Alexander May saw his chance and took it, ordering Exodus to make the jump to the dying system, and they arrived just in time.

Not even five full minutes after they arrived, the Crucible fired and destroyed the relays and all synthetics with it. For a few moments, their fleet had gone dark. But Alexander had studied the Crucible and it's designs, knew what it was meant to do, and what it was more likely to do. The moment the ship had started to fail and all the AI's went dark, he had his engineers working to repair it. Within the hour they had them up and running, or well enough that life support wouldn't fail.

Alexander pressed a button on the control panel, speaking into the ship's intercoms as he did. "This is Admiral May speaking. All Exodus soldiers are to report to the briefing room. All engineers are required to stay at their posts for the next forty-eight hours while we figure out just what went wrong. Alexander out." He walked towards the door then, opening it as he exited and a woman stood up outside the door, saluting.

"Admiral." Alexander paused for a moment as he looked the woman up and down, remembering the day he rescued her from a group of slavers. She hadn't been the only one imprisoned but he'd had no choice. He only had time enough to rescue one of them, and he'd saved her. Luckily enough though...the kid's twin sister had been saved too. By the alliance. And she'd grown up to become one of the most important human commanders in history...

"At ease...Shepard. We'd better go now. We have a long day ahead of us, and the fact that we have to practically rebuild the base doesn't help." The commander nodded as she followed suit after Alexander, none the wiser that the great Commander Shepard was her fraternal twin.


	2. Wake Up

**A/N - Female Shepard is cannon! Now that that's out of the way, hope you enjoy.**

-Ruins of the Citadel: Seven Days Later-

"This is Cerberus Soldier Jennifer Nyte." What was left of Cerberus was little more than a few small pockets of resistance, but it hadn't taken long for someone new to take over. "Things are going as planned here. We located and recovered Commander Shepard four days ago. When we located her she was in critical condition. Our medical officers immediately carried her off to the medical center we set up, a long with assis-" A loud crackling and hissing interrupted her communications, with her sighing in annoyance as she shook her head.

"God damnit. All the supplies we have are fucking useless pieces of shit." The remains of their force had focused on gathering people and resources to recovering Shepard. Again. Because the last time they did that, it turned out so god damn perfectly. "We're lucky we found that Lilliana woman. Not that I trust her." Lilliana was the lead doctor in their project to recover Shepard. They'd been looking for someone who could heal her when that doctor appeared out of nowhere, claiming to be one of the best doctors there were. Cerberus was desperate and in ruins: they had no choice but to say yes.

"Better go check on her anyway. Xandria will kill me if Shepard gets away..." Much to her misfortune, Jennifer was the project leader. She was the one tasked with finding, recovering, and healing Shepard. And on top of all that, she had to make sure Shepard was controlled. Somehow, someway, Shepard had to believe Cerberus were the good guys. Jennifer was just coming up to the ship that had been transformed into their med bay before she paused, pressing against the wall as she heard Lilliana speaking.

"She's coming along quite nicely Dr. T'Soni. You just focus on helping the others repair the mass relay. By the time you get it repaired Shepard will be fine." There was the sound of someone sighing in relief before a voice she didn't recognize spoke in reply to the doctor.

"That's great...just..." The voice sighed again as she continued to speak. "Thank you. How did you convince Cerberus you were on their side again though?" _The hell? Again?_ That wasn't right. Lilliana was a woman who had never been with Cerberus.

"Simple. I didn't tell them who I was. Cerberus is in ruins Liara. The Illusive Man filled them with Reaper tech. When Shepard set off the Crucible, it destroyed them. What's left doesn't know me. Not my face anyway." Lilly laughed then, amused as the other woman, Liara, spoke.

"I see. I'll leave you to it then. Just...don't take any unnecessary risks. Please. I...I can't lose her Miranda. She means everything to me. Like Jack does to you." _Miranda...Miranda Lawson? _That made things a little more complicated.

"Shut it T'Soni. Jack's...she's...and..." Jennifer didn't pay anymore attention to the conversation, heading back to the communications station. She had to repair the damned systems and then report this to Xandria. If what they said about Miranda was true, they'd need more people then they had here to take care of her. And if Shepard really was coming along better then the doctor was letting on...they'd definitely need any help they could get.

Jennifer stepped into the room and froze, looking at the woman before her. "Who the fuck are you?" The woman was dressed in all black leather, and it didn't exactly cover her all that well. Her hair style was...something else too.

"Oh what? You don't recognize me? Project Zero doesn't ring any bells?" As she spoke her body was surrounded by the same blue aura that all biotics had, just much much brighter as she blasted Jennifer backwards, lightning sparking from her fingers to kill the soldier. Jack chuckled as she leaned down to take off the dead woman's armor. "Let's see if I can't fit in any of this." It would come in handy for what she needed to do.

After Miranda contacted Liara, the Asari had found a way to contact Jack. It hadn't taken her long to explain just where she was and what Miranda was up to. Jack figured she owed Shepard for saving the kids, and the last time she had a chance to see the Cheerleader was back during the whole clone thing at the Citadel. It wouldn't hurt to see her again now. Well...not much anyway. "Sorry Corporal Nyte. Didn't have a choice really." She chuckled as she left the room, now wearing a nice set of Cerberus armor. "Time to get my revenge on these assholes...then see if we can't get Shepard back on her feet."

* * *

"I...there's probably one more thing I should mention Miranda..." The doctor glanced up at the screen, narrowing her eyes as she recognized that tone of the Asari's voice.

"What did you do Liara?"

"Well I uh...after you contacted me I went through and tried to contact anyone else we know, try and see if I couldn't get them to help out in anyway they could and I uhh...Jack was one of the people who answered." Miranda sighed, shaking her head as she looked at Dr. T'Soni.

"You do want Shepard alive right? Jack won't exactly be quiet. Hell, the moment she gets here she'll start killing everyone. She hates Cerberus."

"Maybe she does, but maybe that's exactly what you need..." She smirked then. "I've gotta go...Cheerleader. I...contact me immediately if she wakes up Miranda. No matter how late it is or how busy you think I am...I'd like to talk with her the first chance I get." She cut the communications then, leaving Miranda to turn around and face Shepard, looking over the Commander with a sigh.

"You did it. You stopped the reapers. Saved the galaxy...now I guess it's my turn to save you..." For the most part, Shepard WAS getting better. But she was still in a coma. She didn't show any signs of waking, something that worried her. She hadn't told Liara that yet either. There was no point upsetting her. If she did, it would just make it harder for the Asari to focus on what she needed to do. Miranda shook her head. "Please...the universe still needs you. Please Commander Shepard...wake up."


End file.
